Self-Determination without Nationalism: A Theory of Postnational Sovereignty

1. Distinguishing Peoples from Nations

1 Distinguishing Peoples from Nations Peoples, Nations, Nation-States T he nation-state is one of the most widely used, and least examined , concepts in political discourse today. It is implicit in the idea of national self-determination—that nations ought to have their own states. But there is a conceptual difference between nations and states, and they are also usually empirically distinct. It turns out that the nation-state and the claim to self-determination that legitimates it depend on a prior definition of nation. This is where controversy starts. Without defining nations in a certain way, advocates of national selfdetermination risk losing the strong link between nations and states that underlies their normative claims. But there is a third crucial element here—the relation (indeed, conflation ) of peoples and nations. Before nations can be seen to have ineluctable claims to states, nations must become synonymous with peoples. It is only in this way that nations’ claims to states can be “naturalized”—only if the inhabitants of states (i.e., peoples) just are nations—that the desirability of nation-states can be widely acknowledged. And yet if peoples are the same as nations, then there is no issue of the legitimacy of states. All states always already are nation-states because their inhabitants, by definition, are nations. Yet everyone—nationalists and antinationalists alike—rejects this conclusion . Peoples may be (or may become) nations, but they are not so just by virtue of their being peoples. Something more is required. It is this something more—the way national identities are constituted—that generates the Distinguishing Peoples from Nations 19 controversies. Only when we have a theory or concept of national identity distinct from simple membership in a political community can nations be differentiated from peoples and consequently claim self-determination (legitimately or otherwise). But what is a “national identity” and how is it distinct from a simple political identity (as a people)? That is the question. The beginning of an answer concerns the distinction between nations and states. Understanding the unpalatable consequences of legitimating nationstates through claims to self-determination requires making this distinction. Once made, it then suggests the possibility of a definition of national identity that does not eventuate in nation-states at all. Nations properly understood do not have any necessary connection to states, and self-determination itself is a principle applicable to peoples, not nations. Understanding the idea of the nation-state also involves awareness of the ideological aspects of claims to self-determination. Foremost among these is the idea of what is currently referred to as “identity politics.” In its broadest connotation, identity politics is the notion either that political legitimacy (e.g., of a particular state) is conferred by the identity of its members (citizens ) or that the existence of a common identity among a group of persons confers certain rights on that group—for instance, to claim a state of its own. This last case, of course, is that of national self-determination—the claim of a national group to a unique state. The connection between these two aspects of national identity—the ontological and the ideological—is hard to untangle. Charles Taylor has articulated an influential view of nationalism that establishes it as the template for subsequent forms of “identity politics”: “Modern nationalist politics is a species of identity politics. Indeed, the original species: national struggles are the site from which the model comes to be applied to feminism, to the struggles of cultural minorities, to the gay movement, etc.”1 While this view has some plausibility, it obscures certain features of both identity and politics that require explanation. On the one hand, the politically potent character of at least some national identities seems to differentiate them from other types of identity that are not so apparently political. On the other hand, the homology between national and other identities masks a very different kind of politics that characterizes these identities—as is evidenced by the frequent antagonism between nationalism and other identity-based movements. The trouble with assimilating all “identity politics” to the nationalist model is that it masks different types of identity. We need to be much more specific about the type of identity embodied in nations. Taylor regards nationalism as a response to denigration of the “dignity” and “self-worth” of persons in situations of oppression—colonialism, for instance.2 Yet this 20 Chapter 1 assumes that national...